First Encounter With Feathers
by AlexJanna
Summary: 2nd in Footprints on Earth arc in Antichrist!Winchesters verse. The brothers are too nice for their own good and helping strangers in alleys gets them into more trouble than they need. Unfortunately, Castiel doesn't seem to see this as the problem they do


**Title:** First Encounter With Feathers  
**Author: **AlexJanna  
**Fandom:** Supernatural  
**Pairing:** Sam/Dean  
**Series:** Footprints on Earth arc (Antichrist!Winchesters verse)  
**Rating:** R  
**Genre:** AU  
**Word Count:** 7,422  
**Theme Song:** Outkast- Millenium (Link in my profile)  
**Warning:** violence, m/m sex, antichrist!boys, torture, wincest, mentions rape of a minor(not by/of the boys)  
**Summary:** The brothers are too nice for their own good and helping strangers in alleys gets them into more trouble than they need. Unfortunately, Castiel doesn't seem to see this as the problem they do.  
**A/N:** _Second_ in my ongoing Antichrist!Winchesters verse of one-shots, plus a small interlude at the end.

* * *

"Yeah Sammy." Dean groaned as his hips gave a little jerk, his cock hard and throbbing, Sam's mouth hot and wet around him. He fought to keep his eyes open even though he knew the Impala could drive herself for the time it took him to come. It was just more fun, more intense this way.

Sam twirled his tongue around the flared head of Dean's cock and stroked it down the shaft with vicious relish. This was one of his favorite things to do, to make Dean moan and pant and writhe with pleasure. He hummed around his brother's cock and slipped a hand into the open zipper of Dean's jeans to cup his heavy, drawn balls. He gave them a squeeze and rolled them in his palm.

"Uhohhh," Dean moaned again and didn't even try to keep his head from falling back against the leather of the bench seat. His eyes squeezed shut as he let his power seep out thought his fingertips into the steering wheel to tangle with the Impala and keep her on course. "Shit, Sam. Fuck. Your mouth…"

A grin pulled tightly at the corners of Sam's mouth as he slid Dean's cock all the way down his throat until his nose was wedged against his zipper and buried in his pubic hair. He inhaled deeply though his nose and swallowed, knowing it would be Dean's undoing.

Dean hissed through his teeth and gave one, two jerky thrusts into Sam's mouth before he was coming, spurting wave after wave of cum down his little brother's throat and mouth. Sam tried to swallow it all, revel in the bitter sweet taste, but when he finally pulled off with one last caressing lick to the spent head of Dean's cock there was a trail of escaped cum running from the corner of his flushed and swollen mouth down his chin.

It was one of the most beautiful things Dean had ever seen. He didn't waste any time curling a hand around the back of Sam's neck and pulling him forward until he could lick the cum from his brother's flushed skin.

His tongue stroked over Sam's skin with familiarity and his lips nibbled Sam's jaw like they belonged there. When he finally fitted his lips over Sam's to taste his cum in his brother's mouth they were both panting anew and Sam's hips were giving little thrust and jerks straining against the zipper of his own jeans.

Sam was still painfully hard and Dean aimed to remedy that. He pushed at Sam's chest until he was sprawled out next to him in the front seat, his chest having, his cock throbbing and straining.

With one hand returned to the wheel, Dean used the other to deftly unbutton and unzip Sam's jeans, pulling his flushed and leaking cock from his boxers and into the afternoon light. He wasted no time in wrapping his hand tight and hot around Sam's cock and starting a steady satisfying pace.

Next to him, Sam's head had fallen back against the seat and his hips were thrusting in time with each downward stroke. His mouth was open and panting, his hands clutching desperately to the leather beneath him as if to keep him in the seat itself.

Dean's hand was damp with pre-cum, his thumb was spreading it ruthlessly around the heated head and stroking over the slit with practiced familiarity. It didn't take very long before Sam gave a strangled shout and jerked his hips one last time as he came into his brother's hand coating his fingers in hot sticky fluid.

Watching from the corner of his eye, Dean smirked to himself as Sam shakily put himself back into his jeans and fell back into a sated sprawl in the leather seat next to him. When Sam's glazed hazel eyes moved to his, Dean lifted his cum dripping hand to his mouth and licked up his palm and middle finger in one languid stroke.

Sam groaned anew and reached out to grasp Dean's wrist tugging his hand toward him. He used his tongue to lick every single drop of his cum from his brother's skin, twirling it maddeningly around his fingertips and stroking it between his fingers to tickle the sensitive skin there.

When Dean's hand was clean, Sam gave his middle finger one last lick making his older brother's breath stutter. "Damn, Sammy. If you keep that up we're going to have to pull over."

Sam just grinned and pressed himself against his brother's side, letting Dean's hand fall to rest comfortingly on his thigh. "What if I said that's what I was aiming for?"

Snorting in amusement, Dean gave his thigh a squeeze, but kept his eyes on the road. "Then I'd say wait an hour and we'd be checked into a motel where the Impala's seats wouldn't need to be cleaned afterward."

Chuckling at that, Sam pressed an open mouthed kiss to Dean's neck and settled in to enjoy the rest of the drive to the next job.

* * *

It was early spring and the wind still held a chill. Dean liked its nip and was driving with the windows down. Sam was curled next to him, one hand wrapped around the elbow of the hand Dean had laid on his brother's thigh and the other hand wedged warmly between Dean's lower back and the driver's seat.

The city they were in was moderately sized, but the streets were relatively tame with old grandmothers driving American made tanks and soccer moms driving ugly minivans. They didn't have a rapist to find until later that night and Dean was rather enjoying the cruising around town.

That is until he sensed a rather large congregation of demonic power circling one little speck of light. Now, normally, Dean and Sam would avoid other demons as a matter of course unless they were doing something that grated against the brothers' sensibilities, like possessing small children and drowning bags of crippled puppies.

But there was something so very not right about that many demons in one square block of a midsized town like this.

"Hey, Sam." He nudged his dozing brother into full awareness. "We got a school of demons circling something like sharks."

Huffing a little as he rubbed the tiredness from his eyes, Sam narrowed his eyes toward the alley the demons were in and sighed resignedly. He really hated meeting other demons topside. They always underestimated his and Dean's power and then they were forced to kick some demon ass.

Not that, that wasn't fun, it just got annoying to be treated like a child by one's much weaker peers.

"Alright. Do you know what they're ganging up on?" He asked as the Impala came to a stop parallel parked half a block down from the demons.

"Can't really get a read on it." Dean answered with a small concentrating frown on his face. "I've never seen anything like it before."

Puzzled and a bit intrigued, Sam slid out of the passenger side door as Dean slid from the driver's seat and together the brothers began stalking towards the trouble they were sure to get themselves in.

Dean felt a wave of unease settling on his shoulders and signaled for Sam to follow him as he turned one alley before the demons and began to climb up the fire escape to the roof of the building on one side. Sam followed him without a word trusting his brother to know what he was doing.

When they got to the top, they glided silently across the roof and crouched to peer down into the alley with all the demons gathered in it. What they saw made them look at each other with equally raised incredulous eyebrows.

Below them in the alley was a group of ten or twelve demons circling what looked to be a tax accountant in a tan trench coat and a suit and tie. Dean snorted in amusement and nearly burst out laughing at the lameness of the demons' prey until Sam silenced him with a sharp elbow to the side.

Sam twitched his eyebrows meaningfully before both brothers turned their attention back to the scene unfolding below them. This wasn't just any number crunching accountant. It was just the body of one.

But what was in the guy's body was something neither brother had ever seen before. They had no idea what kind of creature it was.

"Come on, come on, little birdy." One demon was chanting with a malicious grin on its face. "We're gonna to make rotisserie outta you."

Dean snorted next to Sam. "Wow. That was… not something you hear every day."

"Quiet!" Sam hissed his eyes locked on the stony faced accountant. "There's something not right here."

"No shit, Sherlock." Dean muttered back, his eyes likewise locked on the scene before them. "That little nerdy guy ain't normal."

Sam nodded, but he couldn't shake the feeling of wrongness about the entire thing. "There's just something…" He trailed off as he caught a strange shadow behind the accountant for a split second before it was gone.

"Holy shit." Dean hissed having seen it as well. "That ain't just an abacus clacker!"

"Right." Sam and Dean waited a second longer than they should have. The demons made to rush the thing wearing a tax accountant and then all hell broke loose.

It was plain that the little guy in the trench coat was out numbered, but he was putting up one hell of a fight. Out of his coat he pulled what looked like a short, silver, Philips-headed sword and started slaughtering the demons as they came within arms length of him.

"Shit." Dean grumbled resignedly. "They're getting their asses kicked. If we don't get down there that guy is going to kill all those dumb fucks."

"Don't complain, Dean." Sam admonished as one demon got the drop on the trench coat guy and got the sword away from him. "Just get your own ass in gear."

Without much thought about it, the brothers launched themselves over the ledge and glided through the air to land on their feet three stories down. Then the shit really hit the fan.

Half of the remaining demons turned on a dime and rushed the brothers. They didn't stand a chance. Dean and Sam put them all on the ground without a single twitch of their powers. The nerdy guy in the suit watched with a stony blank face from where three other demons held him captive.

"Winchester!" What appeared to be the leader hissed in outrage and disgust. "This is my prey, back off and find your own."

Dean snapped his fingers under the nose of the demon in his hands. The creature inside the body gave an unearthly shriek before it lit up like a flash of lightning and the body went limp, finally empty of its invading evil. He dropped the unconscious man to the ground and grinned up at the leader. "I'm sorry. Were you talking to us? Because I could have sworn you forgot to say please."

The leader stared at the brothers in dawning horror and snarled. He rushed them himself, but didn't get much of a chance to do anything.

Dean just shook his head. "Sammy."

His little brother raised his hand and brought the demon to its knees with a spear of power through its heart. Sam's other hand came up and his fingers gave a sharp snap almost dispassionately. The demon screamed and died in a flash of red lightning.

The alley was silent now and the remaining three demons still holding the accountant captive stared in awe and horror at the Winchester brothers surrounded by the still bodies that had once housed their comrades.

Almost as one they dropped the little guy and collapsed themselves to their knees in surrender.

Dean sneered at them in distaste and turned away to start checking the bodies for pulses.

"Please, your highness," one demon began whimpering in exaggerated supplication. "We were only following our orders. We had no idea that this," he flicked a wary look at the still stony faced, but somewhat perplexed accountant, "was your prey."

Sam sighed and rubbed tiredly at the bridge of his nose. He really hated lower level demons. They were all terrible liars and horrible suck ups.

"I don't care." He interrupted the placating demon. "Who were your orders from?"

There was something not right about all of this. Not right about such a large group of demons working together, not right about the dude in the trench coat watching the proceedings in silence, not right about the fact that the demon said they'd had orders. There was something very not right going on here and possibly even in Hell.

The demon gave a shifty look to its two companions before lowering its head. "I cannot say."

"Can't or won't?" Sam asked, suddenly very much not amused by this anymore.

"We were ordered not to tell you." It said.

"Me specifically?" There was no answer and he groaned. Seemed like some kind of conspiracy. Maybe a play for the throne, or, considering there was a strange creature inhabiting a guy in a trench coat still standing there, something else all together. "You know what, never mind."

The demons all looked up at him from their kneeled positions and a light like triumph flittered into their black eyes. He smirked at them. "I'll just send you back to Hell. I'm sure whoever gave your orders will have more of an imaginative punishment than me. Tell them we said hi."

Before the demons could even start to stand and run he'd already latched onto their demon forms inside their meat suits and was pulling them free. They fell back to their knees as one, the black smoke of their real bodies flowing painfully out of their mouths to pool on the concrete of the alley.

The guy in the trench coat made a sound and took a step back, his sword suddenly in his hand once more as Sam flattened his hand in the air, palm down and pushed the black smoke back into Hell with no struggle. Dean watched from a couple feet away and kept a wary eye on the accountant.

Then it was quiet. There was a soft groaning from a couple of the dudes the demons had been possessing, but Dean stepped up to them before their eyes could open and flicked their foreheads with his fingers none too gently, sending them away from the alley to wake up in a field just outside of town.

When he was done the brothers turned their attention back to trench coat guy and the three of them watched each other warily.

"You are the Brothers Winchester." The guy said, his voice deep and rough, his face grave and so serious.

"Who wants to know?" Dean shot back stepping up to stand next to his little brother, their eyes never leaving the guy with the sword. It was the weirdest sword they'd ever seen. It looked innocuous, but they'd seen what it had done to the demons. They weren't going to get any closer if they didn't have to.

The trench coat dude frowned. "I asked you first."

"What are we, twelve? Yes, we're the Winchesters. Now who the hell are you?" Dean asked, his patience worn thin. "Better yet, what are you and why was a gang of demons wanting you so bad?"

The dude frowned again and stared at them hard and searching. Neither brother knew what he was looking for, but he seemed to find it because he straightened from his fighting stance and his sword disappeared like it'd never been there.

"My name is Castiel." He told them. "I am an Angel of the Lord."

His declaration was met with silence and neither brother wanted to believe their ears. "An angel." Dean repeated as Sam's hand shot out to grip his arm in a painfully tight hold. "You're an angel."

"Yes." The guy, Castiel, nodded and watched them curiously as if he couldn't really figure them out. "And you are Dean and Sam Winchester, Antichrists and demon spawn Princes of Hell."

"Holy shit, Dean." Sam sucked in a breath and took a step back. Angels were bad news. Really bad news. They were damned near the strongest things out there. He didn't know if they could take on an angel if it decided to blast them and he didn't really want to find out. "Let's get out of here."

"Wait a second." Dean hissed back at him, his eyes still watching the angel as it watched them back. "This guy's gotta be full of shit. There is no way he's an angel."

"I assure you," Castiel broke in, "that I am." And just like that, in the middle of a sunny spring day a flash of lighting split the sky and a shadow of huge feathery wings appeared on the brick alley walls behind him for a fraction of a second before the sky cleared again and they were gone.

Dean and Sam stared at him in complete shock before both brothers turned on their heels and started for the opening of the alley to get the hell out of there. Their curiosity as to why there was an angel on earth and why he was being hunted by demons wasn't so great as to get themselves smited trying to find out.

Castiel watched them retreat and took a few steps forward in puzzlement. "Wait! Where are you going?"

"Away from you, angel boy." Dean called over his shoulder.

"But you saved my life." Castiel said in confusion. He wanted to know why something inherently evil, an abomination would save the life of an angel, or even any creature not of their own ilk.

"Yes." Dean agreed glancing over his shoulder at the perplexed, short tax accountant. "But angels and demons –antichrists- don't mix. Have a nice… life." He wrapped a hand around his brother's arm and they disappeared from the alley between one blink and the next.

Castiel stared after them in confusion. He'd been sent to earth on a mission and he'd been sure he would fail when the demons cornered in him in the alley. He'd been sure he would die in disgrace for failing his Father. But then the brothers had appeared.

They'd saved him without even realized what he was, they'd shown mercy to the souls the demons had inhabited and showed mercy to their own kind. They'd removed themselves from his presence rather than risk a fight.

They were different from what all angels were taught the abominations of Hell were supposed to be. They were different from what the few other antichrists in the history of Heaven had been.

A fluttering of feathers and the alley was empty. Castiel had some things to think on, things to look into. Something wasn't adding up, and he wanted to figure out what it was.

* * *

Dean was taking these sorry sons-a-bitches for all they were worth. Not a single one of them could play a game of pool to save their lives. And one of them would find that out first hand.

He was a bad apple, the bad seed in the bad apple actually. Not their usual fair, mind you, but he was pissing Dean off and Sam was too busy playing with his laptop sitting in their booth to reel his brother in.

"Well, fellas it looks like I beat ya', again." He grinned wolfishly at them and scooped up the five hundred dollars in cash up from the edge of the pool table.

"Wait a second." The one that had it coming to him gripped a hand around Dean's wrist tightly and not nicely at all. "You're not taking anything, man. You're a dirty cheat is what you are."

Dean looked down at the tattooed, gnarled, and very human hand gripping his wrist. "Is that so?" He smirked up at the guy he was going to skin alive, literally. "You wanna play me again?"

The guy sneered down at him and tightened his hold. "I ain't playing you shit. Now give me my goddamned money."

He had officially worn out Dean's amusement. No one fucking touches or talks to Dean Winchester like that. He just grinned all the wider, his eyes suddenly glowing an eerily malicious green in the dim lights of the bar. He lifted his other hand and gripped the guy's wrist sending waves of searing pain through his arm as he crushed bones with nary a clench of his hand and began to grind them to splinters under his fingers.

"I'm sorry." He said with a grin still plastered to his face as the guy's screams sent the bar into a dead silence. "I couldn't hear you through all the sins weighing on your soul. I could have sworn you were just trying to renege on our bet."

The guy was on his knees now, his shrieks growing louder and more frantic as he tried to pull his mangled wrist away from Dean's hold. His gang of buddies had taken frantic steps back and were watching the scene in horror and fear.

One guy crossed himself muttering under his breath in tex-mex Spanish and Dean met his frightened eyes with a truly evil smirk.

"Dean." Sam drawled his brother's name from his seat at the booth his eyes still glued to the computer screen. "Either put him out his misery or take him outside already. His screaming's messing with my concentration."

Dean looked at his brother and sent him a cheeky grin. "Aw come on, Sammy. This is fun."

Breaking his attention away from his research, Sam just glanced over his shoulder and raised an eyebrow at his older brother.

Sighing heavily, Dean released the whimpering man's wrist and pocketed the money before grabbing the guy's collar and pulling him to his feet. "Alright, up you get. It's on to your eternity you go. Really I'm surprised you haven't been shot by an angry father yet. You can't honestly tell me you didn't know that girl was just fifteen years old? That you didn't hear her when she told you no, that she'd wanted it." He leaned toward the horrified guy hanging almost limply in his grip and smiled at him conspiratorially. "Come on, now. We both know better than that. You just liked the way she begged and cried."

The bar was dead silent and even the praying Mexican had stopped his muttering to stare wide-eyed and uncomprehending at Dean and his victim.

"Dean." Sam's voice held warning and pleading in it. He really wanted to get his work done.

"Alright, alright." Dean drawled dismissively as he started to turn his victim toward the door to the alley out the back. "I'm going. Don't get your panties in a twist, little brother."

He turned only to find his way blocked by a short guy in a trench coat and a displeased frown on his stony face. Dean jerked to a stop and frowned.

"What the-"

"Let him go, Dean Winchester." Castiel ordered in a voice that very few have disobeyed.

Dean just raised an unimpressed eyebrow at him and Sam's head snapped around in alarm to see the angel they'd met only once before confronting his brother.

"Is that you, tweedy bird?" Dean drawled blandly as he gave the whimpering man in his grip another shake when he started to try and get all the way to his feet. "Fancy seeing you here."

Castiel frowned and flicked his eyes to the man in the antichrist's grip before flicking them around the bar once more. Everyone seemed to be staring at them in horror and fear. It was unsettling.

"Let him go." He ordered again.

"Jeez, you have a one track mind, don't you?" Dean rolled his eyes and ignored the glare the angel was giving him. He was riding on a high from the pain radiating off the guy crumpled next to him and he'd be damned if he was going to give up his plaything before he was ready.

Call him a stubborn child, he didn't care as long as he got to torture this jailbait raping fuck. He'd been pissing Dean off all damned night.

"Dean, maybe we should just let him go." Sam said in a low voice from next to him. He hadn't made a sound as he'd made his way toward the stand off. He hadn't wanted to give any of the other patrons or the burly bartender the idea that it was okay to try and rush either his brother or the angel.

"Fuck that." Dean snorted and tightened his grip on his victim's jacket collar. "This guy deserves to get his skin filleted from his bones before he's sent to Hell like all the other fucks we've worked on. I ain't letting some little angel boy stop me just cause he's a self righteous dick."

The angel's frown grew in anger and Sam's voice grew more frantic. "Dean, come on. It's not worth going up against a fucking angel just to teach this guy a lesson before we kill him. Just let it go, please."

Dean was not one bit happy about this, but he couldn't deny his little brother anything. And Sam really did not want him to go up against this angel. Honestly, he didn't blame him.

"Alright, fine." He grumbled before he dropped the injured guy to the floor.

The guy gave a short shriek of pain before he curled in on himself and began whimpering anew as his injured wrist was jarred.

Castiel looked at the two brothers, one frowning like a petulant child with his toy taken away, the other watching him with wary caution. "Thank you, Dean." He said. "For showing this man mercy."

Dean just huffed and crossed his arms looking even younger and more recalcitrant. "Whatever. I still say he deserves to die."

"Dean, you think everyone that pisses you off enough deserves to die." Sam drawled and lifted a hand to wrap it absently around the back of Dean's neck, his thumb stroking consolingly along the skin under his jaw.

A small purr escaped him before he could stop it and Dean frowned again before relaxing into his brother's touch. "Yeah, whatever."

Castiel stared at them with a completely uncomprehending look in his face before Sam looked back at him again and cleared his throat nervously.

"Why are you here, Castiel?" He asked, his voice sounding louder than normal in the silent bar. The patrons and staff were still frozen, watching the scene they were making like a horrific train wreck, completely unable to look away.

The angel seemed to come back from where ever his feathered brain had gone and his perpetual frown reappeared. "I need to speak with you both. On matters of great urgency."

The brothers looked at each other in silent communication before they both shrugged. "Alright." Dean said uncrossing his arms. "But let's get out of here. All these humans are starting to get on my nerves."

And just like that, much to Dean's satisfaction, the entire bar tensed and several people whimpered.

Sam elbowed his brother in the side before pulling out his wallet and taking out the same crinkled, beer stained five hundred dollars Dean had won off the whimpering rapist on the floor. He slapped it down on the bar and gave the wide eyed bartender a sheepish smile.

"For the trouble," he said in way of explanation. "Sorry."

Dean frowned and patted his pockets before shooting his brother an outraged look. "Hey! I won that fair and square."

Sam just gave him a quelling look before turning back to the angel still watching them with unwavering blue eyes. "We'll talk. Outside."

Castiel nodded and crouched down next to the whimpering man still curled on the floor. He looked the man in the eyes and saw straight into his soul.

"Hammond Duke Barker, you have been shown mercy despite your sins. You have been given a second chance at life to correct your mistakes, to make amends for your wrong doing. Do not waste it, because the next time you look death in the eyes it will not be so generous a second time."

His voice rang with truth and power that rippled through the room like a small earthquake rocking each and every person that had heard him to the core. Every person in that bar would forever be changed, whether it be for the better or the worse, is up to them.

Touching Hammond Duke's forehead with two fingers and sending him into unconsciousness, Castiel stood from his crouch and looked at the group still clustered near the pool table and tilted his head in thought for a moment. "Perhaps you should take your friend to a hospital."

His suggestion was met with silence and blank astonished eyes until he was already out the door. Then there was a second of silence and all hell broke loose once again.

Dean leaned against the Impala smoking a cigarette on the other side of town from the bar just outside of city limits. Sam was sitting on the hood with a small frown on his brow.

"Do you have to do that, Dean?" Sam asked with a scrunch of his nose as the smell of burning tobacco floated toward him.

"Yep." Dean smirked at his brother before he took another deep drag filling his lungs with smoke and his head with a nice buzz. "Besides, it ain't like it's going to kill me." He grinned.

Sam still didn't seem impressed, but didn't force the issue. His brother would always have his vices and he was right. The damn smelly things wouldn't kill him, no matter how many or how much he smoked. Not much could.

"Where the hell is that feathery kill joy anyway?" Dean grumbled after another few breaths of silence. "I thought he said he had to talk to us."

"Maybe he's having trouble finding us?" Sam suggested pointedly as he glanced around at the empty crop fields on both sides of the road they were parked on. "I mean you did beam us all the way out of the city after the door was closed behind us."

Dean grinned in mischievous satisfaction, but didn't get a chance to respond.

"I was not having trouble." The voice of their guest brought both brothers' heads around to see the angel standing not five feet in front of the Impala with a stony look on his tax accountant face. "I was delayed at the bar."

"You wanted to talk with us." Dean reminded him as he ground his cigarette butt under the heel of his boot and walked around to the front of the car to stand next to Sam.

"Yes." Castiel nodded looking all business again. "There is… trouble."

"So it would seem." Sam murmured. "Or else a group of demons wouldn't be attacking an angel and you wouldn't be on earth at all."

"Yes." The angel said again, looking away from the brothers, seeming uncomfortable.

"What is it, angel boy? If it's something to do with my brother and me, I want to know what it is yesterday." Dean growled.

"There are tensions between Heaven and Hell." Castiel said.

"No duh." Dean sneered, unimpressed. "It's _Heaven_ and _Hell_."

The angel gave a frustrated growl. "More so than usual." He bit out through clinched teeth. "Hell is planning something. Something big and I was sent to stop it."

The brother's exchanged an equally confused and incredulous look. "You guys think Hell is planning something and Heaven sent you to stop it. Just you. To stop all of Hell's demons."

Castiel seemed even more annoyed. "No. Heaven did not send me. My orders came from… higher." He glanced upwards for a split second before turning his eyes back to the brothers. "And not all of Hell's demons seem to be working toward the same end."

"How can you be so sure?" Sam asked with that tone of voice that would have been perfect in a classroom full of arrogant college students. "Demons are, after all, liars and untrustworthy. How can you really be sure they're all not working toward the same goal?"

Perhaps it wasn't exactly polite to be baiting this guy, but the brothers were just as intrigued and curious as to what their native home was doing as this angel seemed to be. They just didn't want the guy to know that they had no fucking clue what generally went down in Hell. The big players tried to keep their schemes as quiet as possible from the Winchesters and the Winchesters tired to stay as far away from the big players as they could.

It was just better like that for all those around.

Castiel studied the two brothers with a puzzled and considering frown on his face before he spoke again. "If all of Hell was united then they would have recruited you two, their most powerful tools, for their plans. From what I observed the other day in the alley, neither of you knew why those demons had cornered me and you're just as clueless as the angels are."

He's not wrong, Dean conceded to himself. "Say we have no idea what the big cheeses in Hell are up to. Then that means literally no one actually knows their end game. How did Heaven get wind of it?"

"I…" Castiel trailed off and frowned. That seemed to have stumped him. "I don't know, but it is clear that nothing good can come of Hell's machinations."

The brothers stared at the angel for a time before they nodded as one. "We agree." They said.

"But why are you talking to us about it? For all you know we could be in on it." Sam asked.

"Or we just don't care." Dean added, arms crossed over his chest once more.

Castiel stared at them for a moment. He truly believed that neither of them had any part of what Hell was planning. It just didn't add up. That and the rumor was that the Winchesters weren't exactly model spawns of Hell, that they didn't exactly conform to demonic ideals.

He'd seen evidence of that already. And he was going to bet his life, the entire operation to stop whatever Hell had planned, on the fact that Sam and Dean Winchester were far more human than an antichrist, a demon spawn, should be.

"I believe that you care." He said, after the silence had stretched. "I believe that you will help me stop whatever Hell is planning. I believe that you care what happens to Earth and to humans."

Stunned, but faces remaining perfectly neutral, Sam slid off the hood of the Impala and pressed his shoulder against Dean's. "You're asking for our help."

Dean raised an eyebrow at his brother, but didn't take all his attention off the freaky, completely confusing angel in front of them.

Castiel ducked his head and avoided their eyes, seeming almost embarrassed, uncomfortable. "Possibly." He hedged. "I am the only one charged with the task of discovering Hell's plans, and maybe the only one that will be sent to stop it. If it comes to that, I could use your help."

Unease hit Dean in the chest like an anvil and he straightened jerkily from his lean against his car. "No."

"Dean?" Sam glanced over at his brother with a frown.

"No." He repeated and ran a hand through his hair. "Just, no. There are so many things wrong with this, Sammy. If Hell is planning something I want us far, far away from it."

"But Dean, if what he says is true, then they're hiding it from us for a reason. They're hiding it because they think we'll try to stop it." Sam said grabbing his brother by the arm to keep him from storming back into the car. "If they don't want us to interfere then it's got to be bad."

"Yeah, and so?" Dean challenged. "Look, birdy boy over there already said the Big Guy's got him on it. I'm sure the angels don't need us. Let's just leave them to squabble like bitches over a dick like they've always done."

"Dean!" Sam snapped outraged and exasperated all at once. "Did you even hear what he said? It's just him. One lone, lower order angel against however many demons Hell is using to pull this off. You saw him in the alley. He's good, but he's not that good."

"And you want us to what?" Dean looked back at his brother with a scowl on his face, his eyes flashing. "To go against Hell and help out this lonely budgerigar to stop whatever nefarious shit they've come up with now? To get in the middle of this epic rivalry that's been waging since before this planet even existed? Fuck, do you want to get us both killed?"

"Dean." Sam tired again, his voice calm and controlled. "You know they can't really do anything to us. You know we're more powerful than anything Hell's got and I'm pretty sure we're more powerful than most of what Heaven can pull out of its hat as well."

Dean's tirade died on his lips and he looked at his little brother again. Sam's face was pinched in that way that Dean knew meant anything from a childish "I don' wanna!" to a very adult, very frightening, "you know I'm right and I _will_ get my way". A horribly put upon sigh gusted out of him. He never could deny his little brother anything.

"What do you want us to do, Sammy?" He asked, sounding pleading.

"Nothing for now." Sam said gently as he stepped closer and wrapped his arms around Dean's neck, nuzzling his nose into the hair by Dean's ear. "I just want us to keep our ears open. Maybe do a little research. Check in with some old contacts. If Hell's just being devious again, then we'll ignore it. If it's something more, then…"

Dean sighed again and wrapped his arms around his brother's waist tilting his head up to capture Sam's lips in a light, rolling kiss. "Fine. Fine." He murmured into his mouth. "We'll keep our ears to the ground. Jeez, the shit I do for you."

"It's cause you love me." Sam grinned at him.

"Yeah, yeah, whatever." Dean grumbled and pulled away to look back over at the angel. The guy was staring rather intently at his feet and shifting uncomfortably in his place. Dean just grinned again. "What, you can't tell me you haven't heard about us?" He drawled with more amusement than he should. "The incestuous demon spawn?"

"I have heard whisperings." Castiel admitted lifting his head, but was unable to bring himself to look directly at the brothers still wrapped around one another.

"Just whisperings?" Dean asked in exaggerated shock. "Jeez Sammy, we must not be doing it right then."

"Dean." Sam pinched his brother to get him to shut up before the furiously blushing angel internally combusted. "Sorry. We'll see what we can find out, but anything more than that," he shrugged. "You're on your own until we know more."

Castiel met his eyes finally and nodded, looking both relieved, apprehensive and thankful. "Thank you." He said and then with a fluttering of feathers he was gone.

"Huh." Dean stared at the place the little accountant angel used to be. "Why don't we make a cool sound like that?"

Sam just sighed and rolled his eyes, but he couldn't keep the small smile from his lips. "Come on. We've got another job to get to."

They untangled and slid into the Impala once again. The next few miles were silent, neither brother able to shake the feeling that their lives had just taken a turn down a road leading them into interesting times.

Freaking Chinese proverbs.

* * *

The brothers rode the highway in a lethargic state of satiation and success. One more scum bag sentenced to an eternity in Hell, his sins finally thrown into the light.

Sam was leaning against his brother's side, his legs stretched across the rest of the seat, his feet dangling to the floorboard on the passenger's side and his hand curled with the one on the arm Dean had thrown around him. It was too hot to do much more than drive and listen to music.

Of course, though, that hadn't stopped them from indulging in a little bit of fun together. Sam could still taste Dean on his tongue and Dean could still smell their sex in the humid air of the car.

It was a good day.

"Hello, Dean, Sam." That is until their nerdy angel popped in out of nowhere.

Jumping in surprise, the Impala swerved over the line before Dean got it under control again and Sam had half raised a hand to blast the intruder to kingdom come before he realized it was just Castiel.

Still in his trench coat and watching them with a curious bird-like tilt to his head.

"Fucking shit!" Dean cursed as he took a couple of quick glances at the backseat before turning his eyes back to the road. "Where the hell did you come from?"

"I almost blasted you!" Sam exclaimed, a hand pressed to his pounding heart as he tried to get it back under control. "You can't just sneak up on us like that!"

"I apologize." Castiel said, not sounding exactly as sorry as he should be considering he didn't really understand what they were so mad about. "I came earlier, but you were… busy."

Dean shot the angel an incredulous look through the rearview mirror and Sam stared at him with a mixture of horror and incomprehension.

"That's it." Dean hissed and pulled the Impala over with a jerk that he would later be apologizing to his baby for. "That's it, angel boy. We've got to have a talk about what normal people do when they want to talk to someone."

"I'm not a normal person and neither are you." Castiel pointed out as he watched the Impala rumble and bounce to a jerky stop curiously.

"Right." Sam hedge still with a hand pressed to his chest. "But you can't just pop in on us without warning. We could have freaking killed you, man."

"True." Castiel nodded and looked from one brother to the other as they both stared at him sitting in their backseat as if he'd always been there. "I don't understand what you want me to do."

"Call us first, dude." Dean growled, seriously starting to get fed up with the feathery dude being in his car.

"I don't have a phone." Castiel said with a frown and tilt to his head.

"Okay, then." Sam said as if the situation had just proved itself solvable. "Not a problem. You can have one of ours."

"Sam!" Dean protested, but was silenced by a look from his little brother.

"Here," he leaned forward and pulled a box out of the glove compartment. He opened it and pulled out one of the many phones they kept inside along with their fake IDs. "This is one of our extras." He scrolled through it deleting all the contacts except for his and Dean's numbers and Bobby's.

"It already has our numbers in it and a human friend of ours. If you can't reach us just call him. He'll know how else to get a hold of us."

Castiel took the device and stared at it as if he'd never seen one before. He probably hadn't, but he didn't say as much, just flipped it closed and slipped it into a pocket of his trench coat.

"Was there something you needed?" Dean grumbled from his place still behind the wheel, his eyes glaring at the angel in his backseat.

"Yes." Castiel looked back at them both with a stern, serious look on his face once more, curious creepy bird angel long gone. "I have discovered the reasons why I am the only angel sent to stop Hell and why Hell is not united in their endeavors."

Dean cast a quick glance at Sam and Sam met his eyes with an equally grave look. Great. The shit was so about to hit the fan.

* * *

End Castiel's Story.

* * *

**Interlude:** Hammond Duke Barker's Repentance

**Word Count: **1,616

**Theme Song:** Gnarls Barkley – Open Book (Link in my profile)

Hammond Duke Barker was not nice man. He would be the first to tell you that, but something happened to him. Something terrible and great and frightening. And he'd gotten twelve titanium pins and two titanium plates in his right arm to prove it.

When he was a child his father had beaten him, his mother had drank herself to death, and there had been no one to take care of him, but himself. He'd fallen into the wrong crowd, into a gang, but they took care of their own. They'd become his family.

The only family he'd needed.

He'd done a lot of things he's not proud of. Some of the things he's done time for; paid his debt to society. Some of them he hasn't. He hadn't cared much one way or the other. Prison wasn't that much different from where he'd come from on the streets. Just another place he had to fight to stay alive in.

There was one crime however, he'd never truly gotten to unhook from his conscience like all the others.

She'd been real pretty and feisty. Looking for a good time on the wrong side of the tracks. A real daddy's girl gone wild. It was easy to pick 'em out of a crowd, like a pot of honey in a room full of bears.

He'd called her honey, he remembered that, and sweetheart, and sugar. And she'd eaten it up, she hadn't really thought he'd do anything to her, but she'd been young. So goddamned young and naïve. She'd never really stood a chance.

She'd never gotten his real name either, just Duke. Hammond hadn't been in the habit of giving out details of himself when anything even remotely weak could get your ass beat faster than you could blink. She'd just called him Duke.

When she'd cried and begged him to stop, she'd called him Duke.

One truth about what he'd told himself after, after he'd left her numb and shaking in the parking lot of the bar he'd found her in, was that he hadn't really known just how young she was. She hadn't looked fifteen with all that makeup and those clothes, but then again, what did he know? His own mother had dressed just like that till the day she'd died.

It had been three years since that night in that bar three states over that Hammond found himself on the wrong side of something evil and malicious and gleeful. His wrist had snapped like so many twigs and his cries of pain and mercy had gone unheeded.

Those smirking green eyes would forever haunt his nightmares and that deep, unconcerned voice would echo in his ears in the dark of his hospital room when he woke screaming from his morphine induced dreams.

_You can't honestly tell me you didn't know that girl was just fifteen years old? That you didn't hear her when she told you no, that she'd wanted it. Come on, we both know better than that. You just liked the way she begged and cried._

That voice haunted him. And it was right. The demon that had crushed his arm and brought all 6' 5" and 280 lbs of him to his knees without blinking an eye had been right. He'd seen into Hammond's very soul, he was so very sure of that.

And it had been a demon. You didn't have eyes like that if you weren't at least part demon. Bottomless and devoid of mercy, they were.

To this day, Hammond wasn't quite sure how he'd gotten out of that bar alive, but a vague memory of deep blue eyes and another deep voice telling him not to make the same mistakes twice was as much of an answer as he was going to get.

When he woke in a recovery room at the hospital no one in his gang was there to explain any of it to him and he didn't particularly want to find them and ask. It was very clear he'd been given a second chance and something deep down told him not to even risk wasting it.

He'd been released from the hospital and he'd found himself a job as a motorcycle mechanic a state over. Now he was thinking about that girl, with her young face, and her heavy makeup, and her skimpy clothes. He was wondering what had happened to her.

He'd never been charged, the cops had never found him even if he had, and his face had never come up on the tv with a warrant out for his arrest. And in the back of his mind he had always wondered.

So he found her. The computer was a weird and wondrous thing, but Hammond had found her. He remembered her name, Mary Robins, and after that it didn't take much to find out that she still lived in the same town he'd ridden through three years ago, that she was now eighteen years old, that she had a two year old son named Thomas.

Hammond sat at a wrought iron table in the outside seating area of a small locally owned coffee shop across the street from a small park sipping on a steaming cup of black coffee as the sharp fall breeze gently blew changing leaves around in the air. He watched mothers and fathers alike laughing with each other and playing with their kids on the playscape, all of them bundled in knit hats and warm scarves and gloves.

Mary was crouched next to her little boy as he built a lopsided sand castle in the sandbox and Hammond felt his heart ache in his chest with every little bucket of sand the kid dumped. The girl, and she was still so young and still so much a girl, laughed and smiled and molded the gritty stuff as if she didn't have anywhere in the world she would rather be. Thomas, Tommy Hammond could hear her calling him, smiled and giggled and grinned like his mother hung the moon.

This is what Hammond had missed in his childhood. And this is what his son was getting even though his father had raped his mother and left her alone without a single thought to the consequences.

Hammond sat on the porch of the coffee shop and watched Mary and Tommy play until the sun had started to set and Tommy got cranky; tired, cold, and hungry as he was. Mary soothed the little boy and scooped him up in her arms like he weighed nothing more than a feather and placed a tender kiss on his curly blond head.

Hammond watched them until they had driven away, then he stood from his seat, threw his cold coffee away and walked back in the opposite direct to his Harley. He threw his leg over it and rode it out of town and across the state line, back the way he had come.

He was infinitely thankful to God, and that green eyed demon, and whoever that man in the trench coat with his blue eyes had been that he'd lived long enough to see his son, happy and taken care of and loved. But there was no place for him in Tommy's life; he knew that like he knew the tattoos littering his body and the number of screws and plates and pins it had taken to put his wrist back together.

Still, he wrote Mary a letter; a letter of apology and thanks and well wishes. He slipped half his paycheck inside and debated at the post office for twenty minutes before he eventually wrote his return address on the left hand corner of the wrinkled white envelope.

He'd signed the letter Hammond Duke Barker and slipped it into the mailbox with a shaking hand.

He didn't get a reply, but then again he hadn't expected one. Still, he wrote Mary and Tommy a letter every month and slipped half his paycheck into each one. He didn't ever get a letter in return, but he hoped the little money he was able to give them helped. Maybe it would go a ways to helping Tommy go to college.

Hammond had always thought that perhaps if he'd had a different life he'd have liked to go to college.

For nine years he wrote them a letter not ever expecting to get one in return. Then he was clipped by a truck while riding his motorcycle to work and woke up three weeks later in the ICU with more tubes coming out of him than he had fingers.

He was there for another two months to recover from surgery and receive physical therapy for his leg, more pins and screws to match his wrist. One day as he was flipping through the twenty channels of soap operas and game shows they offered on the hospital cable plan, the door to Hammond's recovery room opened.

When he looked, there, standing in the doorway was Mary. She was still so young, still just as pretty as he remembered, but grown up, matured and dressed in a warm jacket and scarf, a pair of well loved blue jeans and softened tennis shoes.

He was stunned and hadn't even realized he'd dropped the remote until it clattered to the floor. She just took a hesitant step into the room and tucked a dark lock of hair behind her ear. Hammond couldn't do more than stare as she watched him for a moment before walking the rest of the way into the room and toward his bed.

Mary met his uncomprehending eyes with a small apprehensive smile and said, "It's nice to see you, Hammond."

* * *

End of Hammond's Interlude.


End file.
